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the approach

Every engagement starts with the same question. What do you need to grow forward? The answer shapes everything that follows.

where to begin

The right kind of help depends on what you are trying to grow.

Some leaders need a thinking partner who can help them see what they are missing. Some organizations need a structured process to untangle complexity and build a talent strategy that actually works. Some teams need space to experiment, challenge their assumptions, and develop new capabilities together. Adena brings systems sight to all of it, whether the work happens one on one, with a team, or across an organization.
Executive Coaching
Adena coaches C-suite executives, senior leaders, and those stepping into their first executive role. Using the PRUNE Coaching Method, she helps leaders see the organizational dynamics driving their challenges, not just the surface symptoms. Sessions are candid, rigorous, and designed to build the kind of systems sight that changes how leaders lead long after the engagement ends.
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Building Adaptive Organizations
When talent strategies stall, culture shifts feel impossible, or change initiatives keep missing the mark, the problem is usually systemic. Adena works with leaders and executive teams to build the conditions where strategy takes hold, talent thrives, and the organization develops the capacity to anticipate change rather than constantly react to it.
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Assessment Certifications

Strategy Labs
Strategy Labs bring leaders, teams, and small groups together to experiment, test ideas, and grow strategically. Co-Labs bring like-minded people together for robust peer conversation. Coaching Labs build systems sight for individuals and teams navigating complex organizational change. Leadership Labs give space to grow new roots and adapt as the workplace shifts.
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Adena draws from a broad range of validated assessment tools to support coaching and leadership development engagements. For a full list, download the Lateral Group Assessment Library.

Assessment Library
  • "Every business decision is a people decision. Every people decision is a business decision."
    Adena Johnston, Growing Forward
  • “If you try to cultivate your talents in someone else's shadow, they might wilt.”
    Matshona Dhliwayo
  • "Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail."
    Ralph Waldo Emerson
is this the right fit?

Adena works best with leaders who are ready to see differently.

Executives & Senior Leaders
As an executive coach to CEOs, CFOs, COOs, and leaders stepping into the C-Suite for the first time, Adena brings hard-won perspective to every engagement. She works with executives navigating complexity, driving transformation, or taking on a new role who need a rigorous thinking partner, not just a sounding board.
HR & People Leaders
With over two decades working inside organizations as both a corporate leader and HR consultant, Adena understands the pressures HR leaders face from every angle. She works with Chief HR Officers, HR Business Partners, and people leaders ready to move from program manager to strategic architect of their organization's talent ecosystem.
Teams & Cohorts
Leading cross-functional teams through startups, turnarounds, and complex organizational change, Adena knows what it takes to get teams moving in the same direction. She works with executive teams and leadership cohorts tackling complex talent or organizational challenges who need someone who can help them see the whole system.

Academic & University Partners

Having served as a regional university president and faculty member, Adena brings genuine insider perspective to higher education engagements. She works with academic leaders on organizational and talent challenges and brings her research and practice directly into the classroom.
Ready to get started?

The first conversation is always the most interesting.

Whether you know exactly what you need or are still figuring it out, Adena is happy to talk. Most engagements start with a simple conversation about what you are trying to build and what might be getting in the way.
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